Released on March 28th 1979, the world now introduced to the Tall Man.

While not a massive success like other franchises that came out around the same time, it garnered a cult following behind the scenes.

Angus Scrimm became a horror icon; the silver sphere that they had introduced in this film became as legendary as Jason’s Hockey mask or Freddie’s glove.

The Summary

Mike, a young teenage boy who has just lost his parents, afraid to lose his brother follow him to a funeral, where Mike witnesses the Tall Man lifting a coffin on his own.

Mike decides to investigate, and discovers that the Tall Man, protected by his flying spheres, is shrinking dead bodies down to half their normal size and reanimating them as slaves. It is then up to Mike, his brother, and Reggie the ice cream man to stop the Tall man. — IMDb

Overview

The residents of a small town have begun dying under strange circumstances, leading young Mike, played by Michael Baldwin to investigate.

After discovering that the Tall Man, Angus Scrimm, the town’s mortician, is killing and reanimating the dead as misshapen zombies, Mike seeks help from his older brother, Jody, Bill Thornbury, and local ice cream man Reggie, played by Reggie Bannister.

Working together, they try to lure out and kill the Tall Man, all the while avoiding his minions and a deadly silver sphere.

Give Nightmares

Let me say this. There is a scene, in Phantasm, at the end of the movie that gave me nightmares for a while, of course, I was five or six at the time when I saw it. However, every night for a month I had to check behind my door when I went to bed. I have long since moved on from that, so no worries.

By today’s standard though, this movie would be considered relatively cheesy. I did sit down with my wife and watch the first couple a few years ago, her first time watching it. She gave me much grief when we watched them the first time, and I couldn’t blame her.

Some of the elements of the film held up, but, most didn’t. The special effects were cheesy and straightforward, the silver spheres didn’t fly on their own as we had initially thought, and instead, we can see the strings they use.

Child vs Adult

Sad to say, the age of high definition is not this films friend. Sad as it is, one of my favorites from childhood has fallen to new age technology.

So, as a ten-year-old kid when this was one of my favorites, I would have given it a 10 out of 10. That sadly is not the case here. Instead, I am reviewing this as a forty-year-old man, and that review is a solid 5 out of 10.

Edward Hale